Expressions

Department of Information System

SoICT, HUST

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Expressions
• Combine values using operators and function calls
• Return a value of a known type (int, double, float,
pointer)
• Example:
• (3+4)/2 returns an integer value (3).
• + and / are operators, 3, 4, 2 are operands.

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Expressions
• An operator is something which takes one or more
values and does something useful with those values
to produce a result

• Each thing which is operated upon by an operator is

called an operand

• Operation is the action which was carried out upon

the operands by the operator

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 Arithmetic Expressions
• take arithmetic (numerical) values
• return an arithmetic (numerical) value
• Are composed using the following operators:
• + (unary plus)
• - (unary minus)
• + (addition)
• - (subtraction)
• * (multiplication)
• / (division or quotient)
• % (modulus or remainder)

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Example
1 + 2 * 3 - 4 / 5
= 1 + (2 * 3) - (4 / 5)

6.2

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 Example (con’t)
1 + 2 * 3 - 4 / 5 =
1 + (2 * 3) - (4 / 5)

Divide two integers,

the result is also an
integer

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Example (con’t)

1 + 2 * 3 - 4 / 5 =
1 + (2 * 3) - (4 / 5)
7
= 0

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Example (con’t)

• Use a real number to create an expression that

return a real value

1 + 2 * 3 - 4.0 / 5
= 1 + (2 * 3) - (4.0 / 5)
= 1 + 6 - 0.8
= 6.2

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Comparison operators
• < (less than)
• <= (less than or equal)
• > (greater than)
• >= (greater than or equal)
• == (equal)
• != (in-equal)

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Example
1+2<3
= (1 + 2) < 3
=3<3=0

• Not to be confused between == and = (assignment)

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 Example
Prevent
misconsidering
as assign
operator (=)
3 == 4 → 0

3 != 4 → 1

3 < 4 → 1

3 < 4 && 5 > 2 → 1

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Logic
• A special data type that has only two values:
• true
• false
• It is used to create the selection of conditions or the
loop for an algorithm
• Boolean expression: is an expression that return
only true/false

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Use int as logic
• In C, logic values are represented by integer
• 0 is false
• any non-zero value is taken interpreted as true (often use
1)
• All expressions in C return a number
• A “true” logic expression will return 1, otherwise 0

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Logic operators
• … is used to built logic expression
• && (and)
• || (or)
• ! (not)
• comparison (==, !=, <, >, <=, >=)

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Example
(3 ==3) && (1+ 2) < 3
= 1 && (3 < 3)
= 1 && 0 = 0

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 Example
Prevent
misconsidering
as and bit (&)
Prevent
misconsidering
Prevent 5 && 4 → 1 as or bit (|)
misconsidering
as reverse bit
(~) 1 || 4 → 1

! 0 → 1

! 0 || 0 && 2 → 1

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Bit operators

An expression that only uses bit operators is not

logic expression. Result of this expression is an
integer.
& (and bit)
| (or bit)
~ (negation)
>> (shift right)
<< (shift left)

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Bit operators
• Not to be confused with boolean operators: &&, ||, !
• Example:
5 = 101
& 4 = 100
-------------
= 4 = 100

1|4→?
5 & (4 >> 1) → ?

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Common errors
#include <stdio.h>

/* Common errors */

int main()
{
Return value is
int score;
always 1
scanf("%d", &score);

if ( score == 9 || 10 )
{
printf(“Excellent\n");
}
Return value is
return 0;
0 or 1
}
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Common errors (con’t)
#include <stdio.h>

/* Correct program */

int main()
{
int score;

scanf("%d", &score);

if ( score == 9 || score == 10 )
{
printf(“Excellent\n");
}
return 0;
}
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Common errors (con’t)
#include <stdio.h>

/* Common errors */

int main()
{
Return value is
int score; always 1

scanf("%d", &score);

if ( 8 <= score <= 10 )

{
printf(“Good\n");
} Return value is
return 0; 0 or 1
}
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Common errors (con’t)
#include <stdio.h>

/* Correct program */

int main()
{
int score;

scanf("%d", &score);

if ( 8 <= score && score <= 10 )

{
printf(“Good\n");
}
return 0;
}
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Assignment expressions
• Assignment = is also an operator that returns the
assignment value.
• This operator can be used to create an expression that return
a value: result of the assignment is the right value of the
expression
• Example:
(x = 4) → 4
(y = 0) → 0
a = b = 5 ➔ a = (b = 5) ➔ a = 5
• Can create an expression with a series of assignment
x=y=z=4

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Common errors (con’t)
#include <stdio.h>

/* Common errors */

int main()
{
int score; Incorrect
wrote as an
scanf("%d", &score); assignment

if (score = 9 || score = 10)

{
printf(“Good!\n");
}
return 0;
}
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Common errors (con’t)
#include <stdio.h>

/* Probably the most common C error. */

int main()
{
int score;

scanf("%d", &score);

if (score == 9 || score == 10)

{
printf(“OK!\n");
}
return 0;
}
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Some extend assignment operators
Operator Example Equal expression

+= x += 5 x=x+5

-= x -= 5 x=x-5

*= x *= 5 x=x*5

/= x /= 5 x=x/5

%= x %= 5 x=x%5

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Increment, decrement operators
• ++ is the increment operator
• ++i is equivalent to i = i + 1
• -- is the decrement operator
• --j is equivalent to j = j - 1
• Two ways of writing: prefix (++i) and suffix (i++)
• They are different in return values of expressions.
Example, if i = 5
• Prefix return value after adding 1, (++i) → 6
• Posfix return value before adding 1, (i++) → 5
• In both cases, value of i increases by 1

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Example
int i = 5;
++i;
printf(“%d”, i);

• Output: 6

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Conditional Expressions
• … a ternary operator
Condition ? Expr2 : Expr3
• Example:
int max,a,b;
…
max = ( a > b ) ? a : b;

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 Casting data type
• Assignment is only carried out in variables and values
in the same data type
• C can automatically convert data type for assignment
if this conversion do not loose information. Example,
convert from int to float
int a;
float f;
f = a; /* OK */
a = f; /* not OK */
• In case of loosing information, casting data type is
needed. Example, convert from float to int.
a = (int) f;

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Precedences
• Unary operators (!, -)
• Multiply, divide (*, /, %)
• Addition, subtraction (+, -)
• Comparison 1 (<, <=, >, >=)
• Comparison 2 (==, !=)
• And (&&)
• Or (||)

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Example
• 7+5&&4<2+3-2/3||5>2+1
• (7+5)&&4<2+3-(2/3)||5>(2+1)
• 12&&4<(2+3-0)||(5>3)
• 12&&(4<5)||1
• (12&&1)||1
• 1||1 = 1

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Exercise
• 3&&7+4/3-2>6+-3*10%2
(!, -)
• 2+3/5>6-10/2||3/7&&4
(*, /, %)
• (3<<1)&(4>>2)|5 (+, -)
• (1>4)&&(2||(3<4)) (<, <=, >,
>=)
(==, !=)
And (&&)
Or (||)

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Thank you
for your
attentions!